


Dark and Empty

by love2imagine



Category: White Collar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-09 07:05:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5530382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/love2imagine/pseuds/love2imagine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Winter time, Neal's first winter with the FBI. Just a few thoughts.</p><p>Characters and back story Jeff Eastins creation. Story mine, mistakes mine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dark and Empty

**Author's Note:**

  * For [danajeanne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/danajeanne/gifts).



 

 

Neal’s footsteps echoed in the large vacant spaces of the dark house. He almost raised a smile: normally he would be soft-footed as a cat in an unoccupied house full of treasures, quick and efficient in removing those pieces most valuable and most easy to offload…or keep…(but that was always wishful thinking. He had never had a stable home for long enough to enjoy them. They visited with him a while, then were sold by Mozzie to fund the next move.)

This evening his steps plodded drearily. They sounded as he felt: old, tired, hopeless. Dark and empty as the house.

 

The day had been long and boring: mortgage fraud files that he was sure were reproducing like rabbits somewhere, but not as cuddly. The rest of the team were glad.

“Don’t jinx us, Caffrey!” Diana had warned, humour mixed with blue steel. (He wondered if she’d ever soften towards him.) “Looking at files means we get to go home on time and be with our families! And I want to spend this evening with Christie and a bottle of good white, not dodging bullets, however tedious the hours seem to you till home-time!”

“Or recess!” Peter had grinned, over-hearing as he walked past. “Caffrey never seems to appreciate being bored here instead of in a cell!  
..........“And having endless reading matter – and access to coffee!”

Neal almost let it go…it was hardly worth it…but he sensed that if he didn’t object, one day he might actually find himself brain-washed into agreeing…so, “I could read in prison, Peter, and choose something more interesting! Or sleep! And that stuff you call coffee we inmates would have called cruel and unusual punishment! As are these!” He flapped a file.

Jones gave a huff of laughter, and Neal glanced over, surprised. Perhaps there was hope!

“Only three and a half hours to go,” Diana said, soothingly.

Neal groaned quietly. They were all ignoring several things. Such as if a case warranted it, they would be recalled from their homes anyway. And, though it was possible they weren’t ignoring, merely totally oblivious: He didn’t have a family to go home to. No family for decades and no friends. For agents who should have read people and understood their motivations and emotions, these agents seemed strangely unaware. Or perhaps deliberately uncaring.

So when they all gave each other hugs and shook his hand with ritual good wishes, and he boarded public transit with the blank-eyed public, many of whom seemed to have been fortifying themselves against their families, or their loneliness, it was a relief. The team didn’t hate him, but they disregarded him as a human being. Which may just have been worse.

 

He wished June had left Bugsy, at least, but Neal could never be sure when he would return, and she couldn’t leave any of the staff waiting for him indefinitely: they all had plans, too.

He didn’t bother to turn on the lights. The house was decorated with June’s usual good taste, and that made him feel more an out-cast. The only memories of Christmases, real Christmases, were from when he was very little, and now in retrospect, those images held more pain than joy.

Now he just wanted to make himself a sandwich with the bread he'd appropriated that had been left over in the lunch room, shower and fall asleep. Perhaps if he drank a bottle of the wine that June always shared with Mozzie, he would be lucky enough to sleep through Christmas and Boxing Day, insensible. New Year’s wasn’t the same. New Year’s wasn’t for families.

  
He reached the top of the stairs and frowned, stopped, all his senses activated.

There was someone in the loft.

June was away with her family in Atlanta, Mozzie always tried to spend Christmas with Mr Jeffries. Alex would never darken this threshold again! The house should have been deserted. The door was a little ajar and he pushed it very carefully, then, his eyebrows rising and his adrenaline falling, he walked in.

“Mozzie!”

“Yeah.”

“But – Detroit - ?”

“Figured you could use some company. Mr Jeffries understands. Christmas Eve. June away.”

Neal’s heart warmed and softened and, though he’d never admit it, especially not to Mozzie, he had the absurd feeling that he was close to tears. He cleared his throat and said, “Something smells good.”

“Roast turkey and…well, everything!”

Everything was right: a decorated, prettily lit tree twinkled from the corner, tinsel and gleaming glass baubles in deep, jewel colours draped here and there. Covered plates of snacks grouped with as yet unopened bottles on the end of the draining rack, the table was set with good china, accented with more clusters of small baubles around tall, slender candles.

“You didn’t…!”

“No, though I could have! No, this was June. She didn’t want you eating whatever the hell you find to eat when she doesn’t feed you, not on Christmas! And she left some Cognac and an extra selection of whites and – oh, sherry, too.”

“But – why? She didn’t need to! She’s been kind enough already.”

“She wanted to, Neal. And she has the means and the heart…it gives her pleasure to be able to share. She’s been where you are, you know.”

“Yeah, when Byron was put away,” Neal nodded, walking through to hang up his suit and tie. After a few moments he reappeared in soft, casual clothes, and took the glass of wine Mozzie held out to him. With some difficulty, he said, “Thank you, Mozzie. I know what spending Christmas with Mr Jeffries means to you.”

“Here’s to the past, to Mr Jeffries and all he was to me,” Mozzie said, lifting his glass…a first toast of many, Neal projected, “but also to the present, and our future. You won’t be shackled forever!”

“No. No, I won’t!” Neal clinked their glasses together. He sank down across from his friend, sniffed the aromas appreciatively and, catching the loving twinkle in Mozzie’s eyes, he smiled. “To new memories! Happy Christmas, Moz.”

 

 

The End

 

 

Happy, blessed Christmas, everyone, and a WONDERFUL 2016!

 


End file.
